Industrial adhesive

A temperature sensor in the storage refrigerator measures continuously and reports deviations to a cloud via an IoT gateway. In the ifm example, the IO-Link sensor is connected to an io-key that transmits over the cellular network. If the temperature exceeds the limit, an email or SMS is sent immediately, along with a signal on site. A fault is therefore noticed before the adhesive becomes unusable.

Many industrial adhesives only keep their bonding properties if stored at the specified temperature. These include acrylic, epoxy, polyurethane and silicone. The manufacturer in the example uses adhesives with specific storage conditions and a best-before date, after which bonding performance is no longer guaranteed. That is why every production area has a refrigerator whose temperature and door are monitored.

In electronics manufacturing, adhesives often replace soldering because many components are temperature-sensitive and are only plugged in. High cycle rates add to this: applying a dot of adhesive is faster than other fastening methods. Correct storage therefore becomes a prerequisite for quality. The ifm group monitors all adhesive refrigerators in its production areas automatically for this reason.

It replaces regular checks of every refrigerator by staff and reports problems immediately. At ifm, employees only need to check and fix the fault when an alarm is raised. Temperature histories remain available in the reporting function over the long term, for example when investigating quality issues. Because the solution transmits over the cellular network, no connection to the IT infrastructure or cabling was required.